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<\/a>\nGeorge Rhynes’ video of the last two citizens speaking at the\n7 November 2011 County Commission meeting has\ninteresting closeups on the county staff while\n<\/a>\nGeorge Rhynes’ video of the last two citizens speaking at the\n7 November 2011 County Commission meeting has\ninteresting closeups on the county staff while\n\nthe Chairman was answering Matt Portwood.<\/a>\nThen at 1:35 Tony Daniels answered the request for “any other business”\nby walking up to the podium and talking.\n\nHe cited life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness\nfrom the Declaration of Independence:\n
\nHow can we pursue happiness when we don’t even have a job?\nI believe the city and county and Industrial Authority and the Chamber of Commerce\nneed to work more together to create an atmosphere of trying to bring more\nindustry inside the city.\nWe have highways coming through Valdosta.\nI hope to see in the near future that the county and the city and the\nIndustrial Authority and the Chamber of Commerce\nwork like brothers and sisters.\nBecause you know and I know that you are elected by the people\nof the people and for the people, and I’d like to see that….\nBecause we need more entrepeneurs, we need to see all governments\nin this area promote that….\n<\/blockquote>\nI suspect the Chairman was asking the Commissioners whether they\nhad any other business, but he wasn’t clear about that.\nI think what Tony Daniels had to say was important, and citizens\nshould be able to say they have other business.\nHowever, since he had not signed up to speak before the meeting started,\nhe was in violation of\n\nRule #1 from the Commission’s hastilly adopted Policies and Procedures\nfor Citizens Wishing to Be Heard:<\/a>:\n\n\n\n\n
- Persons wishing to speak at \u201cCitizens Wishing to be Heard\u201d shall sign in\nwith the Clerk of the Board of Commissioners. The Clerk shall be available\nfor this purpose at least 10 minutes before the scheduled time at which the\nmeeting will begin. Each person signing in shall provide his or her name,\nhis or her mailing address, his or her daytime telephone number, whether he\nor she is a resident of the County, whether he or she is a taxpayer of the\nCounty, the subject on which he or she wishes to speak, and the action\nrequested of the Board of Commissioners, if any. The Clerk shall prepare\nand have available a form for the purpose of persons signing in to speak.\n<\/ol>\n<\/blockquote>\nNeither the Chairman nor any Commissioner made any objection to that\nviolation of their own rules.\n
\nOf course, by now, no one should be surprised to discover yet another way\nin which those rules are merely guidelines completely at the discretion\nof the Chairman.\nWhich makes me wonder why they have them at all….\n
\nHere’s\n\nthe video:<\/a>\n
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